


Dead Soldiers

by TheDistantDusk



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-29
Updated: 2019-01-29
Packaged: 2019-10-19 01:16:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 696
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17591969
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheDistantDusk/pseuds/TheDistantDusk
Summary: "Ginny’s the only person on earth who could manage to look sexy while a baby cherub drops confetti hearts into her hair." (2019 Harry/Ginny Valentine's Day Fest)





	Dead Soldiers

**Author's Note:**

> I’d like to extend a big old non-thank you to Goods who put this in my head when I have a million other projects. Not cool. 
> 
> *Apparently*, this was completed for the Harry/Ginny Valentine's Day Fest. APPARENTLY. 
> 
> Anyway, please R&R! :)

 

By February 1999, death isn’t something Harry likes to think about. 

There’s no point in perseverating over the dreary and miserable and wretched, not when his life now brims with so much light and love and happiness that he's convinced it's all imaginary at least once a week. On rare occasions, when Ginny’s sleeping on his bare chest, her silky red tendrils illuminated by a stray moonbeam, he’s even able to forget that he'd spent his childhood being discarded and ignored.

Harry’s half-drunk as he winces and looks around the pub, although he’s not quite sure if the memories flooding his brain are related to the alcohol or not. Regardless, he knows he’d like to get to that point right now, actually— the point where they’re both starkers and sated, their skin glistening in flickers of candlelight— but unfortunately, they’re A) at a pub, B) on a double-date, and C) surrounded by so many cheery Valentine’s Day couples that Harry knows his chances are slim to none.

It doesn’t help much that Ginny’s drunk, which means she’s more adorable than ever. She’s batting her eyelashes at him from across the table, an easy grin dangling from her lips. Her chest is bright red, peppered with chocolate freckles, and he’s trying very hard to ignore that she’s sucking on a single finger that’s crept to the side of her mouth. Harry shakes his head in wry resignation; Ginny’s the only person on earth who could manage to look _sexy_ as an obnoxious baby cherub drops confetti hearts into her hair.

Beside them, Ron and Hermione are talking about...something? Harry has no idea, but he doesn’t really care— and based on Ginny’s coquettish smirk, she’s equally oblivious. A sea of empty pint glasses stretches between the two of them, each receptacle rimmed with an echo of foam, each telling the story of a joke or a chortle that’s already faded into memory.

Harry takes a bleary look at one of the glasses and numbly acknowledges that this is the only type of dead soldier he ever wants to think about.

Then Ginny draws a deep breath as she sways a bit in her seat, and before Harry knows what’s happening, he feels one of her bare feet— _when had she taken that shoe off?_!— traveling up his calf in slow, even circles. Her entire upper-half remains completely immobile save for the twitching of her lips, and Harry once again confronts a simple fact of being her boyfriend: Ginny will always, _always_ best him at the whole covertly-arousing/public-flirting thing.

Not that he’d ever stood much of a chance...because _Merlin_ , she’s beautiful, isn’t she? He’s not quite as far gone as she is, but her whole body nonetheless hums with a roseate glow, her amber eyes wide beneath lazily-fluttering lashes, her expression poised in anticipation as she watches him. And tortures him beneath the table. _And waits_.

With a shock to the chest, one that sucks the air from his lungs, Harry comprehends something in a single, thunderstruck moment: There was a purpose behind every sacrifice, every cold night, every shred of courage and determination he'd summoned over the course of his whole life. 

The distance between the two of them is suddenly suffocating, oppressive, claustrophobic...and Harry can’t bear it, not for another moment, not when they’ve already spent a whole lifetime apart. He doesn’t think twice before leaning across the table and brushing his lips against hers. Ginny lets out a breathy gasp and adjusts her foot against his thigh, but she doesn’t hesitate to kiss him back, doesn’t hesitate to match his ardor.

They both find a way to ignore Ron’s groan of disgust.

After several heated moments, Harry pulls back, panting, and stares into her eyes. She arches a red eyebrow— a challenge if he’s ever seen one— and he chuckles through a delirious grin. He tucks a stray piece of hair behind her ear, his brain and chest and heart filled with _Ginny_ , and that’s when Harry Potter finally recognizes something that he should have accepted have long, long ago.

Dying was worth it, really...because it led him straight to _her_.


End file.
